Gossip

DeVito to Make West End Debut in Sunshine Boys with Griffiths???

| London's West End |

3 January 2012

Hollywood star Danny DeVito could make his West End debut appearing alongside Richard Griffiths in a new version of Neil Simon’s comedy The Sunshine Boys, according to reports in the Daily Mail.

The comedy, which premiered on Broadway in 1972 and was adapted into a 1975 film starring George Burns and Walter Matthau, is being updated by Simon ahead of an April opening. The Mail‘s Baz Bamigboye reports the show’s West End berth will be announced later this month.

Thea Sharrock will reportedly helm the production, which is produced by Sonia Friedman, and is expected to play a limited season through to July ahead of a potential Broadway transfer.

The Sunshine Boys focuses on Al Lewis (Griffiths) and Willy Clark (DeVito), a vaudevillian team who grew to hate each other and never spoke to each other off-stage during the final months of their 40-year act. The pair are reunited for a television special on the history of comedy, with much of show’s humour derived from efforts to get the two cantankerous actors into the same room for rehearsals.

Richard Griffiths‘ myriad stage credits include West End outings in Equus alongside Daniel Radcliffe and Heroes alongside John Hurt and Ken Stott, as well as recent National Theatre appearances in The Habbit of Art and The History Boys.

His recent screen roles include the Harry Potter franchise, the most recent instalment of the Pirates of the Caribbean films and the 2005 film adaptation of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.

Best known for his Hollywood film appearances, Danny DeVito starred in the Off-Broadway productions such as The Comedy of Errors and One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest in the early 1970s, going on to star in the Oscar-winning film adaptation.